


bit by bit, I'm gonna build my house in the wildest thickets

by SargeantWoof



Series: These Are My Myths Now [3]
Category: Ancient Greek Religion & Lore
Genre: Alternate Take of a Myth, Character Study, F/M, Persephone is Her Own Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-27
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-12 12:54:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29010855
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SargeantWoof/pseuds/SargeantWoof
Summary: She dropped through the earth, a scream tearing from her throat as she fell, her flowers tumbling down with her, pollen and sap spinning through the space with her before she grinned, hitting the ground with a muted thud and snapping her head up to see him, staring at her."Oh Persephone," he said, a grin growing in the corners of his mouth. "What did you do?"
Relationships: Hades & Persephone (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore), Hades/Persephone (Ancient Greek Religion & Lore)
Series: These Are My Myths Now [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2139507
Comments: 14
Kudos: 77





	1. Chapter 1

She was reduced to - to innocence, the scent of flowers, a scream - things lacking the whole - snippets of what was re-packaged and relayed to men, landing on the ears of her mother and her father. 

She was taken - that much was true. She was out, picking flowers, when the ground opened up and swallowed her whole. 

She was, she was, she was - until, she wasn't. 

***

No one asked. 

***

The thing about spring is that often, people forget just how cloying it is. 

It appears, nipping at the heels of winter, the sky lightening, the flowers blooming, and people rejoice, because finally, the hard and harsh winter is over - finally they are saved. 

People forget how spring's sweet scent covers the rot that froze during winter. How the heady scent rises in the wind, bringing heat and warmth, but also tempestuous storms and thick rains. 

Spring comes, as she always does, but she is not the simple joy of flowers growing. She is layered, wrecked against her own edges, her own worst enemy. 

***

She was out, before she disappeared, giving her mother a flashing grin and a quick nod as she darted for the trees. She ran through the forest, sticking to the shadows, admiring how cool and lovely it was. 

In the world, with no mother and father around, she was free, allowed to be with no constraints. She wasn't quiet or careful, wary of her mother's churning temper or her father's loud bellow. She could simply exist as wild as she was. 

So, when she had outrun her attendants and watchers, she slowed to a stop, coming across a thicket of blackberries. 

It was there, with juice staining her hands and a wild look on her face as she wove herself a crown of thorns, that darkness himself came across her. 

***

Her mother called her Kore, expectations thick on her tongue. Her father called her nothing, he simply expected her to do as he commanded. She gave herself a name, one she whispered in the dark. 

Persephone.

*** 

Darkness was neither here nor there, he simply was. 

As he watched the girl set her crown against her brow, the thorns bringing beads of ichor to the surface, he knew. 

She simply _was_ too. 

***

She winced as her mother tightened her grasp on her arm, plastering a smile on her face at the warning look her father sent her before she dropped her eyes to the ground. 

"Welcome All," her father boomed, the floor rattling with the force of his voice. "Welcome to the Solstice." 

At his words, the crowd let out a raucous cheer, Persephone's lips twisting at the noise. Her mother cut her eyes to her in another warning before she let go, her words _do not embarrass me_ and _stick close_ unspoken but understood. She dipped her head in acquiescence letting her mother get away from her before she spun towards the edges of the crowd, slipping through the columns to find herself a solitary place. 

She slowed as she came across a singular soul, out in the shadows of Olympus. 

"Oh," she said, quietly as he lifted his head to meet her inquisitive gaze. _"Oh,"_ she repeated, her eyes flashing in surprise as he stood, darkness billowing out from underneath his feet and shadows stretching towards him. He said nothing, inclining his head as he strode past her, the marble bench he had been sitting on in sudden vibrant sunshine as soon as he passed by her. 

Lying innocuously on the bench sat a crown of purple-robe black locust, its lilac flower bright and bronze-tinged leaves shimmering. 

Persephone reached out, trailing a hand over the crown, grinning when the sharp prick of thorns met the flesh of her thumbs. She placed the crown delicately across her brow, letting the flush of wildness prickle across her skin before she hid it, turning and going back into the party. 

***

 ~~No one asked.~~ He asked. 

It's just - well - no one believed her when she said _yes._

***

She left more often than not, finding excuses to leave, reasons to run, places to hide. She was wild, she had decided, and she was unable to be contained. 

She was raw, flesh and sinew, a simultaneous breaking and re-making, a gift and a curse to all who laid eyes on her. 

She was her own person, her own body, her own soul. 

***

When she stumbled across him for the second time, she left scratches down his arm, watching with narrowed eyes as his alabaster flesh bled ichor, instead of the shadows she expected. 

He smiled at her, a grin of fluttering crows and heart-stopping danger and wickedness and cruelty, and he didn't temper the gleam in his eyes. 

She narrowed her eyes and bared her teeth, biting her cheek and spitting her golden ichor at him. He laughed, tossing his head back before turning cool eyes on her. She eyed him again and snarled, feeling wilder than ever, her heart thumping in her chest. 

If her mother had seen her then, she would've been horrified. Her father would not have even recognized her. 

But he did, and in the end, that was all that mattered.

***

Spring is deadly. 

She hides her poison in flowers, her stench of death beneath her smell of growth. She does not forget - though others do - that things must die for her to come to fruition.

Death comes for all, but he never looks more beautiful than he does in Spring.

***

They met again and again, days slipping past each other until months had come and gone. 

They rarely spoke, content instead to draw blood, to exist, to saunter through thickets and brambles, letting thorns drag on their skin. 

Until - until - the day came, and he leaned in close, and whispered in her ear. 

***

He was a proud God, a strong one too, though that was neither here nor there in the grand scheme of things. 

However. 

He was so _very_ proud. 

And so, with all the nagging of his family to find a wife, to settle down, to get some peace - it all was endlessly irritating but only in the way a fly irritates a cow. There was no real bite to it. 

He knew he would not care for a partner who had no desires of their own, who sought to be powerful through him and not powerful in their own right. Any who was afraid of blood was unacceptable. 

So, when he stumbled across her in the woods, he did not covet and he did not crave. 

He stood and watched the drops of blood fall and thought, _an equal_. 

***

"Would you like to come with me to see how the dead live?" 

"Oh," she said, her tone delighted. "Oh, _yes."_

***

She stole down to his kingdom, slipping through the cracks and crevices he had pointed out to her over their walks, until she found the river of abandoned dreams, Cerberus standing guard proudly. She cooed at him, her wildness crackling over her skin as she scratched his middle head, and watched the steady stream of ghosts slip past her curiously. 

She turned to follow, feeling scraped raw and new, with splinters in her lungs as she grasped just how much she did not know. 

How much had been kept from her. 

She ran along the path, following it to the grey castle built into the dark cliffs towering over the dead. She strode in, tossing open the doors and scowling at his raised eyebrow. 

"I want," she said boldly, glaring at him in a dare. "To know." She pointed out the doors she had come, waving her hand about in an attempt to encapsulate what she meant. "All of it." 

He leaned back, his body a line of lethal grace. "Oh," he said slowly, smiling at her, another fierce grin of darkness. "The dead do nothing but tell stories," he said, nodding his head at the doors. "And teach." 

She grinned at him, fierce and bright and luminous in the dark grey of the Underworld. "I'll return later." 

He shook his head, smirking. "I have no use for a cage," he said. "Come and go, it's yours."

She grinned even brighter at him, her crown of thorns scratching across her forehead as she whirled around, heading for the pools of silvers ghosts she could see in the distance, her feet steady throughout the rocky ground as she ran. 

***

She stood among the trees in the sunlight, watching as her brother pulled his chariot of sunbeams across the sky. She scowled at the freedom he had, unattached from the earthly coil, unburdened from attendants and watchers. She still had to run for miles to escape, sliding between trees and changing direction, until the voices following her fell fainter and fainter on the breeze. 

In the beginning, it had been an exciting way to start her days. Now, though, now, it felt tedious because even with all the time in the world, she had more important things to do than escape the women her mother assigned to be her sycophants. 

She had no need for endless praise and everlasting sacrifices. She wanted - craved, really - to know. 

She frowned, looking again at the sun. She only knew of one who would let her be.

And, earlier, she had heard her mother whispering plans of marriage into one of her attendant's ears, the nymph flushing green in shock as she met Persephone's eyes. 

She tilted her head, resting it against the trunk as she watched the sun crest in the sky. She knew who she wished to marry. 

***

"Come now, Kore," her mother said gently, her venomous words held fast behind a façade of sweetness. "We must be going to the meadows, for it's time to gather your bouquet to present to your father." 

Persephone nodded once, a sharp dip of her head before turning and heading to the meadow, her mother's gaze heavy on her skin as she started plucking flowers caustically, ripping them from the ground without heeding their roots, their drops of pollen spilling out from between her clenched fingers, her displeasure obvious to all who laid eyes on her. 

She paused suddenly, her thoughts whirring. _Perhaps not_ , she thought, sending a savage grin at the ground before kneeling down and gently tugging the roots of the flowers away from the soil. _Perhaps not_ , she thought again, shoving her hand into the red-orange clay and thinking of him. 

She nearly gasped at the rush of power that left her, before she stood, hiding her scheming eyes behind her flowers and sighing so that none would look to closely at what she had done. She spun in a circle, grasping the flowers and their stems slowly, letting her mother think she had been cowed into doing her duty. 

She took a deep breath, when her mother's gaze finally left her and glanced down, taking in the shifting doorway she had created. She looked up quickly, taking in her distance from her attendants before smiling and stepping down once hard. 

She dropped through the earth, a scream tearing from her throat as she fell, her flowers tumbling down with her, pollen and sap spinning through the space with her before she grinned, hitting the ground with a muted thud and snapping her head up to see him, staring at her. 

"Oh Persephone," he said, a grin growing in the corners of his mouth. "What did you do?" 

***

She would refuse to answer for years, but she knew, in that very moment, that she had chosen a side. 

And contrary to popular belief, it had not been his. 

It had been hers. 

***

Earlier, in their beginning, he had tried, once, to call her Kore. 

She had screamed at him, her throat rough and raw from her sudden expulsion of noise, that it was not her name. 

He had blinked, one quick flicker of movement before he dipped his head and asked, quietly, "Who are you then?" 

*  
Persephone. Bringer of Destruction.   
(an aptly named girl)  
*

"Persephone," she had snapped, a defiant look in her eyes. 

He tipped his head back, eyeing her contemplatively. "I like it," he said, grinning at her scowl. "Not that you need my approval for anything." 

"No," she said, grinning at him suddenly, her eyes fierce and glittering, a savage twist to her lips. "I don't." 

***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this is another strange drabble that's been bouncing around my head for days on end and wouldn't settle until i finished it - i wrote the entire thing listening to 'bit by bit' by mother mother on repeat 
> 
> there might be a second part (there probably will bc i do love these two && do want to maybe tell the tale of what happens after)
> 
> i hope y'all enjoyed! I'm probably going to edit the other few i've written and link them together in a mini-series of unrelated re-imaginings


	2. Chapter 2

She took herself, fashioned a crown of thorns, and declared herself a feral queen.

It was not her fault, that she was _right._

***

He joined her on the third time she had escaped down to the Underworld, before she had burrowed her way in, watching with an arched brow as she trotted down the street, her eyes fixed on the glowing expanse of the ceiling, the pale luminescent fungi sprouting down towards the ground, thin shimmery tendrils extending from the caps.

She paused, staring at the plant. "I thought this was the land of the dead."

He frowned, glancing upwards. "It is."

"Then how?" She asked, gesturing upwards and turning to look at him, a more serious look on her face.

He paused for a long moment, the two of them staring at each other as ghosts swirled around them, each brush against them a tiny whisper of their past against their skin. Persephone fell completely still, her plan slowly taking root as she awaited his answer.

"The land of the dead has soil just like anywhere else," he finally said.

She nodded in response, turning abruptly and continuing down the path, _soil_ echoing in her head over and over again before the words twisted, with a low throb at the base of her skull, into _growth._

***

Spring is a season of growing.

Thick strawberries and round blueberries, sweet corn and dry wheat, crisp peppers and juicy tomatoes - new food exploding from the ground rich and vibrant and new and whole. It's foals nosing their mothers, calves meandering in fields near their herd, eggs cracking and birds taking flight.

Growth however, is not just physical. She's a stretching of minds, a sense of relief in the potential.

Spring is many things, many ways, but she's never, _ever_ , stagnant.

***

Persephone would not find out for eons, and even then the knowledge would be accidentally told, but in the beat between her fall and her scream, her mother saw the flicker of movement from the corner of her eye and thought _good riddance._

***

She paused in the doorway, moments after her heralding fall, and blinked at the new arrangement before turning and arching an eyebrow at him. He shifted on his feet, an unusually serious look on his face.

"Not a cage," he began. "But an opportunity." She held up her hand, striding into the throne room to more closely examine the additional throne.

The two were identical, low rough seats hewn from basalt, the dark grey stone porous. She sat in one, before rising and sitting in the other, her face tight in concentration. They were equidistant from the entrance, and similarly uncomfortable. She rose, looking at him again, a little furrow in her brow.

"To rule is to be uncomfortable with any suffering," he said, his dark eyes still serious. "Even the King of the Dead does well to remember that."

Persephone glanced from him, back at the two cramped and oddly desolate thrones, before nodding once in agreement. She brushed a hand over the straight back, shivering slightly at the feel of the cool stone as he walked closer.

"I do not know how long you will wish to stay," he said, quietly. "But you know power and have power and are power and that deserves its own throne, but while you are here, I give you my power, as I rise and as I sit. "

She startled, glancing up at him, her eyes wide at his proclamation. "Are you sure?" She asked, finally, measuring him.

He inclined his head once. "Not a cage," he repeated, coming to stand next to her behind the other throne, the shadows clinging to him as he walked. "Never a cage."

***

In the way the stories would be told for centuries from the fall, it would be twisted; her innocence, his darkness, her actions, his words.

The stories would miss the ease at which they settled into each other, the wariness that slowly left her as they walked in the sun, and the devotion that grew between them in the shadows.

Stories would speak of innocence stolen by evil, a forlorn mother, a forced relationship.

They would all miss the choices that were made, consciously and with weight, the desire, the expectations, the cruelty of the world above.

He would become a serpent, an awful and monstrous beast, and she would be reduced to a simple maiden with flowers - nothing more and nothing less, mere shells of the truth.

***

Take away her voice, and the story spirals into lies as soon as she turns away. 

***

It was unspoken between them, but they both knew that she was there to stay.

***

At first, there was no worry of the above ground world. They had all they needed in the depths of the earth, soil thick around them, growth evident in everything they did. They sat together, dined together, walked together, as each day she felt freer and freer even as she began the painstaking process of twining herself with him, letting her essence be nurtured by his darkness and letting him find solace in her wildness.

It was a hard process, to let her be open and vulnerable to him, even as they didn't speak of it.

Their very beings brushed against each other, and though they knew each other inside and out, she still felt the flush of admiration when their souls touched, his delight in knowing her and being known, obvious in every motion.

It also, simply, was not done, which heightened both of their enjoyments of the process.

Gods do not need each other, they do not let others in, they walk the world, and they are lonely fickle creatures. They do not bind themselves to others. They do not mingle powers. And they most certainly do _not_ care.

(If the Parthenon had known what was happening miles below their feet, they would've stormed the Underworld, ripped the two apart, and kept them, as far away from each other as they possibly could.)

((But they didn't.))

And so, instead, Persephone and Hades took delight in a merging of powers, a sharing of souls.

***

People forget, as well, that growth starts below the surface. Plants are not fully formed things, sprouting from leafy greens with ease. They push through soil and dirt and pollen and dust and unfurl, gently, one leaf at a time, to the sun.

They must break _through_ , in some cases, destroy the seed they came from, before they can rise, proudly bearing the efforts of their labor to the fresh air.

***

She lifted her head, from her study of the map of the Underworld, pushing the crown of thorns across her forehead and twisting to look at him. He heaved a sigh, rising from his crouch to hold a hand out to her.

"Come," he said, a wry smirk twisting his lips and he gently towed her through the castle to the throne room. "We have a visitor."

"Oh," she said, grinning at him. "Is that what the sensation is?" He hummed under his breath, his emotions smooth for the most part, when she gently reached out to prod him with her hand, pushing intuitiveness and _whatwhatwhatwhatwhat_ against his mind. He glanced up at her, letting the flicker of _wrong_ and _force_ rise towards her before he sat down next to her in the throne beside hers.

"Shall we?" He asked, watching idly as she stroked a hand down the pomegranate tree growing beside her chair. She nodded once, affecting a façade of nonchalance, even as she let her face grow wilder and colder, her teeth suddenly sharper in the shadows, her eyes glinting with a hint of lush feralness. He smiled at her fondly, the smile turning sharp as the doors swung open and Hermes strode through it.

"Uncle," he greeted once, before turning to look at Persephone. "Kore-" He hesitated, and she arched a brow back at him. "Kore," he repeated softly, fully taking her in. "What's he _done_ to you?"

***

Her mother had not been idle on the surface, either.

From her mouth, a tale of corruption and lust and a maiden draw from the good path and a demon sprouted, its tendrils stretching farther and faster than she anticipated. She was not one to wait and had been delighted at the sheer magnitude of the response.

Zeus in all his, _husbandbrotherkingruler,_ glory had been inarticulate with rage that his daughter had been taken. He had sworn justice.

*

Justice would be served, in _all_ her eternal glory.

*

But not at his bequest.

At _hers._

***

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i guess there's probably going to be a third part since i keep writing out these tiny pieces and then thinking i can finish her and she turns into another section
> 
> but goddamn, do i love persephone and hades


	3. Chapter 3

When Spring comes, fully and unrestrained, she comes in the roar of waters, the flush of danger, the cracking of ice.

She is not calm. She is not _sweet_.

***

"Give me," He said, slowly mere days from the finalization of their plan, staring down the Parthenon as she stood at his side, forcibly silenced by Zeus, the two of them ripped from their homes violently in the night. "Give. Me." He repeated as he turned to her, his face devoid of his usual smirk before looking back at the others, all twelve of them arranged around him, Demeter alternating between glaring at him and then at her. "Very well," he said. "I'll take her."

Beside him, she stiffened before glaring at him, twisting the curl of a smirk that threatened their whole charade into a deeper glare as around them, the others relaxed at the sign of distrust between them.

"Good," Zeus said, narrowing his eyes at her. "My will be done, you are set to be bound tonight."

Hades inclined his head, peeking at Persephone from the side of his eyes and nearly grinned at the look of delight floating in her eyes. "As you say brother," he said. "Your will be done." 

***

The thing about merging souls is that, it changes a ~~person~~ God.

***

She snarled wordlessly at Hermes, her lips curving up in a mockery of a smile. " _He_ did not do anything to me," she said, disdain and cruelty dripping from her vowels, as she swallowed down the rage that pooled in her mouth with the taste of ash and rot. "It is I who did this," she corrected, a sly gleam in her eyes.

"Kore," Hermes said, stepping closer to her and glancing at him out of the corner of his eye before forging on. "We can save you - we know he has twisted you into vileness and stripped you of yourself, and we, we can fix it. Father-" he said, before taking a rapid step back at the ominous crack in the stone beneath his feet. He glanced at Hades, fear rising on his face. "We can save you," he finished in a whisper, pleading. "Please come home."

Persephone laughed, tossing her shining hair over her shoulder and rising, ignoring the way her hair caught on the pomegranate tree and tugged, strands of her hair draped across the branches like fine lines of gold. "Do not speak to me of home," she said, striding forward as Hermes stepped backwards, her rage evident in the lithe lines of her body. "You know _nothing."_ Hermes dipped his head once, his face panicked before he pivoted and disappeared, a faint pop the only sign he had been there.

From the throne, he rose, satisfaction obvious in the curve of his mouth. "That was a show," he commented idly, his grin growing even more as she turned to him and hissed, her rage still boiling beneath the surface of her skin. He reached out slowly, waiting for the flicker of acknowledgement against his hand before he touched her. "They will not stop," he said, after a beat.

She twisted under his palm, stepping closer to him and lifting her hand to grab his in a too tight grip. "They will if we force them too," she said, her eyes serious.

***

The plan built was one of desperation and arrogance, hinging on their own predictions of how others would react and their own capabilities. It was cobbled together in breathless moments and creeping whispers, tied tightly off with their belief in themselves and their hope for a future.

What they did not realize, was that it was a plan forged with steel and power, sacrifice and sorrow - a plan forged by two who saw each other, heard other people's _no_ , and thought _yes_. The plan was spun into being, delicate and fragile, yet strong and true, a spider's web of promise and longing and understanding. 

Those above did not understand.

But -

Women who carved themselves into the underworld are not women to underestimate.

And men who share power freely and unreservedly are not men to laugh about.

***

She stared at him for a long moment, her gaze measuring as she watched him pace in front of her, shadows creeping out to join him, others melting away in the light. He spun, turning to look at her.

"Trust," he said, slowly, as if tasting the words he was speaking. "Is a delicate thing - and yet, when I saw you in the woods, your crown of thorns, your hands stained, I _knew_."

She shrugged, satisfaction in the curl of her lips and the gleam of her eyes. "When the dark looked at me," she said, baring her teeth at him and snapping her jaw playfully. "I simply looked back."

"How lucky am I," he said, hedonistic pleasure flashing over his face as he sauntered towards her. "To have been blessed by you."

"How lucky," she murmured back, rising to meet him, her feet bare against the stone, her eyes flashing, her eternal crown pressed against her skin, the familiar sight of ichor smudged around the band. "I have caught darkness eternal," she said, viciously pleased. "I have tamed the night."

He laughed, the sound deep and rough, like glaciers shuddering against each other, devastation threaded into the noise. "To tame the night-"

"-I must be the night," she finished, sliding her arms up and around his neck as he gently laid his hands over her hips. "The night," she whispered, bringing his lips to hers and grinning into their first kiss, "is me."

***

Here is what the stories got wrong.

They were strangers. And then they were planets, orbiting around each other, drawn into the other. And then, they were friends, bloodied and violent and true. And then, they were twin flames, souls bared, secrets spilled. And then - and only then - then, they were lovers.

The point to them was never the physical.

It was the unfathomable experience of being wholly known to another.

***

Hermes arrived back on Olympus, took a moment to breathe, strode in, and spoke of a perverse craven god and his little pet project.

As he spoke, faces twisted in revulsion and pity, few glancing at her mother to see how she fared, watching sorrow steep into her face, anger following swiftly. She held her head high, meeting the eyes of all who dared look at her, swallowing down the whisps of satisfaction at having caught, and _held_ , the attention of the other eleven.

Only Hestia, eternal guardian of hearth and home, watched the clenching of her hands and movement of her spine and thought _trespasser_ , her narrowed eyes caught on the insidious nature of Demeter's actions and the hidden depth of what she was not saying.

***

At the heart of them, in the tiny flickering chambers of their lives twined together, lay a pomegranate tree.

She loved fruits and vegetables, loved the sharp snap of a crisp cucumber in her hand, the fleshy skin of the tomato, the earthliness of the potato, the snag of tiny pistils in her teeth from a raspberry.

She _adored_ pomegranates - from their tiny crowns, to the way they split open, the fragrance that spilled across her face as she devoured them. She craved the way they stained everything, her skin, her clothes, _him_ , their red juices spilling down her lips as she ate their seeds fistfuls at a time.

He had no such opinion, but as with everything, she brought her delight of the fruit to him. He began craving them as she did, wanting the crush of them in his teeth, the color of them splashed across him. When they traded kisses, the ripe smell of pomegranates passed from her to him, even if she hadn't eaten any that day.

It made sense then, that of all things, pomegranates clicked the whole plan together.

*

_Do not eat the food of the dead_ ; is common knowledge, common sense.

It is a lie.

*

She sprang up from her seat, her eyes on the seeds spilling across the table. "If force, brute, angry force, won't work," she began, looking up. "Would trickery?"

He blinked once, a slow hinge of his eyelids, before he leaned back on his hands, and smiled at her, his grin the same grin he had given her above, filled with darkness and menace and delight at her and her feralness. "Please," he said, extending his arm. "Enlighten me."

She smiled back at him, a twisted primitive thing, and crunched a seed between her teeth, the pulp staining her teeth violently red and began to speak, as he began to laugh, pleasure high in his throat at her utter viciousness on display for any and all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay i don't even know what is happening anymore bc i thought she was going to have just one more but i guess not? now she is going to have another, and probably another, given how all this is going. 
> 
> ah well, life be like that


	4. Chapter 4

How weak, they thought her, how naïve.

She was going to take those ideas, cram them down their throats, and _laugh_ as they choked.

***

She got ready in the nights leading up to them being taken by dressing the clothes of an innocent, satin edged with lace, flowers threaded in her hair, her eternal crown smearing ichor across her forehead as she reclined on the couch near him.

Neither of them commented on how her flowers were monkshood and petunia's, or how her crown had become the thorns and buds of nightshade.

He instead rolled his eyes at her get up, preferring her with her usual wildness, rather than the false persona she was adopting. She smirked back at him, delighting in the charade, and kept quiet, the two of them on edge for when the wards of the Underworld would crackle, heralding the beginning of the invasion.

***

She whispered in Hermes' ears as he slept, crooning tales of desolation and sadness, of six seeds eaten and a contract, of hope and yearning, of want to come _home_. She fit herself to his expectations and watched as he slid into place, a beacon of helpfulness as he went to her father and pled her case again and again, until he was granted permission to bring the two of them back to Olympus.

She whispered too, into the darkness and wilderness and the cool spring air, her words carried in the night and through the season, about a lonely soul finding another, about the edge of sadness turning to anger, about truth and about justice.

Not many heard, even as her voice slid through the shadows across the world, but those who did felt the prickle of tension at the base of their skull and cast their gazes unknowingly towards Olympus, far more aware of the danger the Gods were courting by challenging the feral Queen.

***

There is something that seeps through the air, the lingers in the swell of the night, that heralds the change of Spring, before she has arrived. The way air nips at fingertips lightens and the hum of creatures awakening begins.

It begins, not with a bang, but with a murmur.

 _In like a lamb_ , people mutter. _Out like a lion._

It's as if the lamb woke up, and realized she had never been prey to begin with.

***

She let Hermes sweep into the Underworld, let him coax her from their bed, her voice wavering and thin, the tiny stitches of mockery in her voice inaudible to Hermes.

 _He_ , however, knew.

He let his lips curve in a cruel smile, let his nephew see his disdain. He watched with dark eyes and an impassive face as Hermes brought them both from their home, ichor dripping from his hand from his expected token resistance. He let his _otherness_ spike in response to each insult Hermes let slip, let himself fall deeper into the bastardization of themselves.

He watched as her fingers trembled, how she kept reaching out to touch the flowers in her hair, how in the cool lights of the Underworld, she looked almost translucent, almost a ghost of herself.

An obvious far cry from her topside form.

He watched as she bent her head, to whisper more words of sorrow to Hermes, looking at him over her shoulder and shuddering, before sending him a quietly panicked look that only he knew was tinged with sly and smug satisfaction of their plan working.

He knew with each quiet word, she was binding them closer and closer to their goal.

Closer and closer to freedom.

***

And though people warn others of how animals react when they're cornered, in the same way, they warn of women scorned, they never speak of how destruction reigns when women awake to power at their fingers.

It is a heady rush, that Spring brings, power and delight and noise as the world awakens, as the women awaken.

As their plans unfurl like the bloom of a snapdragon, they rise from the chill of winter, and they _know_.

Power comes to those who seek it.

Power stays, however, for those who _use_ it.

***

She stood in the halls of Olympus, her face alight with muted fury, her fright shifting to a pale anger, her words dripping ceaselessly from her mouth as she spun a thick story from a lie slimmer than gossamer silk, until Zeus huffed and flicked his fingers at her.

He turned to look at Hades, his face devoid of emotion. "And you are… _together_?"

He nodded, one sharp tilt. Zeus sighed again, looking from his brother to _loversistergoddess_ Demeter, and inclined his head towards the duo. Demeter sniffed, her eyes raking over her daughter's visage, before settling on Hades, and her mouth twisted, a glimmer of satisfaction in her eyes.

"She ate the food of the dead," Demeter said quietly, her eyes darting to Zeus. "I see no other option than to have them bound so she cannot run from her duties."

Zeus hummed under his breath, giving them an evaluating look. "Very well," he finally rumbled, his voice echoing throughout the throne room. "Hades." He paused for a moment before nodding. "I give you mine and Demeter's daughter, Kore."

***

All words of the turn of the season have been used before - powerful, fierce, gentle, steady, warm, vicious.

They have been stacked against each other, set opposite the other, melded into one meaning.

 _Spring_.

As the warmth of the sun kisses brows and brings life, so too does the rot decay beneath feet and the clashing of violence escalates.

Life begets life, wholly and truly.

***

Persephone bit her lip, letting ichor pool in her mouth until it began to spill down her chin and throat, tracking lines of gold over her skin, before she spat the blood into a bowl beside her.

She lifted a hand, dipping her fingertips into the blood before she brought them to her skin, beginning to trace swirling patterns, faint runes tucked in between nonsense designs. She grinned at the sight of her bloodstained skin, baring her teeth in a mockery of her once gentle smile.

Bloodied, vicious, _wild_ , she would go to her wedding as she was.

Untamable.

***

 _He_ stared as she came through the archway.

She pressed her lips together to hide her smile, delighting in the look of soft awe in his eyes, hidden behind his sly grin, and the horrified expression across Athena's face that spread as she informed those next to her, exactly what was decorating her skin.

The watching Gods murmured to themselves, pity leaving their faces as they began to long for the two of them to go, return to the Underworld, return to where their crass ideas could no longer affect their beautiful world.

Zeus shifted at the front, Demeter a steady presence beside him. He eyed Persephone with disgust before he cleared his throat and began to speak the words of binding. She tuned him out, watching as _he_ traced his eyes over her swirls, watching as he began to pick out the runes and the hidden power within the design.

He lifted his eyes to meet hers, his eyes gleaming as he put it together.

Zeus would see her bound to him, subservient, frightened, _alone_.

She would be having none of that.

"So mote it be," Zeus finished, slamming his lightning bolt to the ground as the electricity crackled across the floor and a thunderous crash broke over their heads.

Persephone gasped at the rush of power, at how _now_ , they were truly, absolutely, sharing themselves between two bodies. There were no more secrets, not that there had been any, to begin with, but they were connected like none other before them.

She grinned at him, dropping the frightened act, and stood straight up, glancing across the Parthenon.

Only Aphrodite understood what had happened and she winked at her before fading from the group and disappearing.

Zeus cast a heavy glance at Hades. "Now, you are free to go."

"Oh," Persephone said, her eyes glinting. "We were free all along."

Zeus furrowed his brow at her, his countenance darkening. "Brother," he warned, his hand tightening on his weapon. "Control her."

Persephone giggled, the sound echoing through the room until it had twisted into a mad noise, high-pitched and threatening. "Oh, _father,_ " she spat, her laughter leaving her completely. "You have no idea what you've done."

She reached out, entwining her hand with Hades, and grinned at the looks of revulsion she received, before she slammed her barefoot heel into the marble floor, cracking through eons of power at the heart of the Gods.

*

They fell, as they always have.

( _together_ )

*

They dropped through the earth, his hand tight in hers as they fell, her blood glinting across her shoulders as the sunlight grew dimmer behind them, the two of them hitting the ground with a muted thud as he snapped his head up to see her, staring at him.

"Oh Persephone," he said, a grin growing in the corners of his mouth. "What did you do?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> once again, I have no idea what this is - and this was not what I was planning on writing but sometimes, _sometimes_ I guess stories force themselves out 
> 
> who knows if there will be another piece (probably though) I truly have no plans for anything anymore 
> 
> but please, let me know if you like it!


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